Construction (west):
Business climate improvement

The enterprises in western German construction judged their current business situation far less negatively than in December 2002. A brightening of the business outlook, however, was only noticeable in building construction, but this in all three categories. In contrast, in civil engineering scepticism increased again. Equipment utilisation (57%) decreased insignificantly overall and was thus below the level of the previous year. Order backlogs (2.3 months), despite a slight increase, were smaller than twelve months ago; dissatisfaction with order reserves decreased somewhat.